This blog displays scenic photos taken from around Grand Marais, MI. Photos of rockhounding and nature adventures are also posted. Information is included about the Gitche Gumee Agate and History Museum and other scientific subjects. For more information about the museum and our unique mineral art, books, DVDs, and Online rockhounding classes please go to www.agatelady.com.

About Me

After more than a million miles of corporate travel, I moved to my family's home town of Grand Marais, MI in 1994. I now operate the Gitche Gumee Agate and History Museum as well as earn a living as a mineral artist and writer/designer. I hope that this blog will help me share my adventures and art with family, friends, museum patrons, and customers. You can learn more about the museum at www.agatelady.com.

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

The other night I drove out into the school forest with friends, Jamey and Lois. We were curious how much worse, if any, the shoreline erosion has been since we were last there in June. We figure that we have lost more than 15 feet of bluff since then. Maybe Lake Superior has always carved its way bigger.

Using my zoom lens, I captured several animal tracks (wolf, bear). It appears that the animals may be getting stuck down on the beach and cannot get up the escarpment sand bluff.

Monday, September 28, 2015

Last night I, of course, had to document the super-moon lunar eclipse. A super-moon occurs when the moon is the closest to the earth. This makes the moon appear 14 percent larger in the night sky. An eclipse happens when the earth moves between the sun and the moon and blocks the sun's rays from reflecting off the moon. The last time that both events occurred on the same night was 33 years ago. The next time it happens is in 2033.

I decided to capture the event from Sable Lake. First I parked at Sable Lake and climbed into the dunes. However, the angle of the moon did not allow me to capture any moon reflections off the lake, so I drove to the overlook and set up my tripod.

Saturday, September 26, 2015

For today's posting I decided to check in with NASA's Earth observatory photo webpage at http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/. It has been awhile since I have done so....

Iran Mountains

NASA Earth Observatory images by Joshua Stevens, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey. Caption by Kathryn Hansen.

Iran’s Dasht-e Kavir (Great Salt Desert) is lined by the Alborz
Mountains to the north and the Zagros Mountains to the south. Plate tectonic forces "wrinkled" this flat landscape into small,
elongated mountains.

One such mountain is Kuh-e-Gugerd (Kuh-e-Gugird), which rises about 600 meters (2,000 feet) above the desert plain. The image was captured on August 14, 2015.

Kuh-e-Gugerd means “mountain of sulfur,” The name is probably
related to the gypsum (hydrous calcium sulfate) known to be there.”
Indeed, gypsum is present in some of the rocks visible at higher
elevations (light brown in the image). But there is more in the mix:
limestone, marl, and minor shale also contribute to what is known as the
Qom Formation—marine sediment that was deposited in Iran tens of
millions of years ago, during the Oligocene and early Miocene epochs.

The Qom Formation is also the oldest part of the mountain in this image. That’s because the mountain is an anticline:
rock that has been folded and then slopes away from the crest. The
folding and subsequent erosion has exposed the oldest and once-deepest
rocks of the mountain’s core, which appears almost white in this image.

California Wild Fire Scars

NASA Earth Observatory images by Joshua Stevens, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey. Caption by Adam Voiland.

Devastation of the sort that the fast-moving Valley Fire unleashed rarely has a single cause. Long before the blaze started burning through Boggs Mountain State Forest, decades of aggressive firefighting—and too few prescribed fires—left the woodlands overloaded with brush and other fuel. Meanwhile, extreme drought
over the past four years has sucked the forests dry of moisture,
leaving the trees unusually combustible. An army of destructive bark beetles also has made the pine forests vulnerable.

So when a weather system delivered abnormally hot temperatures and
gusty winds to Napa, Sonoma, and Lake counties in northern California,
the forests were primed to burn intensely. The first spark likely came
from a shed fire
in the town of Cobb on September 12, 2015. Once it had escaped the
shed, the fire spread with such speed and intensity that firefighters
could do little to slow it. Within 48 hours, the inferno had burned an
area twice as large as Manhattan
as it raced southeast along ridges in Boggs Mountain State Forest
toward the communities of Harbin Springs, Anderson Springs, and
Middletown.

As flames pushed toward these towns, thousands of people were forced
to flee their homes with little warming. In all, authorities report that
1,910 structures were destroyed, including many at a popular hot springs resort
in Harbin Springs. At least three civilians lost their lives; four
firefighters were injured. The Valley Fire has already become one of
California’s most damaging fires. Only two other blazes—the Cedar fire in 2003 and the Tunnel Fire in 1991—destroyed more structures.

Stormy Pacific

A NASA satallite captured this image of one typhoon (Kilo), one hurricane
(Jimena), one tropical storm (Ignacio), and one tropical depression
(Fourteen E) churning simultaneously in the Pacific Ocean at 15:00
Universal Time on September 2, 2015. All of these storms are tropical cyclones at various stages of maturity. None of them currently threaten land.

Earlier this week, the three stronger storms (Kilo, Jimena, and Ignacio) made history as they paraded across the Pacific Ocean at Category 4 strength. The ongoing El Niño—a
complex weather pattern characterized by warm sea surface temperatures
in the central and east-central Pacific—is encouraging tropical cyclone
development in the Pacific basin even as it inhibits storms in the
Atlantic basin.

Typhoon Soudelor Seen from the ISS

This photograph was from the International Space Station (ISS) taken on August 5, 2015, as Typhoon Soudelor
advanced on Taiwan. Forecasters project that the typhoon will make landfall in central Taiwan early on August 8 as a category 3 storm. Sustained winds of around 160 kilometers (100 miles) per hour are expected for the northern half of Taiwan.

Friday, September 25, 2015

The other night one of my friends from down state, Joan, and local friend, Carol, and I had a beach fire dinner east of town. It was a beautiful evening to do so. It has seemed like September has been warmer and nicer than July was!

Thursday, September 24, 2015

Yesterday I left early to drive to Marquette to get fitted for my hearing aids. Thanks to Carol Rose for being my hearing advocate, Jackie at Superior ENT, and the State of Michigan for helping to cover some of the cost. I look forward to picking up my hearing aids next month. In the future I will be better able to communicate with people as "the agatelady."

On the way back, Carol and I stopped by Memorial Falls in Munising, which is owned by the Michigan Nature Association. I just love this grotto as well as the falls.

This photo shows the top of the falls (center top)...

I held onto a tree and held my camera out over the falls, looking down the falls. I did hold on tight!

The path to the viewing platform runs along sandstone cliffs....

Memorial Falls without much water going over it this time a year....

Here are a few agate close ups I took with my USB microscope camera. The first is a copper replacement agate....